We had some very interesting weather over the Labor Day weekend. I’d have blogged this sooner, but I was out of the country for a business trip.

We were out in Aguanga for the holiday weekend. The excitment started on Saturday. Quite a bit of moisture had been flowing into the area, and was being backed up by an additional flow from hurricane John. The cumulus clouds started forming by mid-day, and by mid-afternoon, you could see several large thunderstorms in the distance. There was a particularly large storm over the Palm Desert to Pinyon Pines area. The National Weather Service had severe storm and flash flood warnings up. We went into Anza for Mass at 5pm. It was very hot and humid, and it was fairly windy. When we came out of Mass at 5:45, the wind had changed direction and the temperature had fallen by 10-15 degrees.

The real excitment started when we were driving back. As we were driving southwest out of Anza on California Route 79, I looked out the window to the southeast. There was a huge cloud of dust. It looked like the pictures I’ve seen of big dust storms in China and Australia. This one was about 1,500 feet high and extended from Anza off into the distance. I lost no time driving back to the house in Lake Riverside Estates, about 10 miles from Anza. As we were driving, the cloud kept getting closer to us. It must have been moving 30-40 miles per hour, and since we were driving obliquely to its direction, it was catching up to us.

It finally swirled around us when we got back to the house. It was a mass of gritty air and high wind. No damage, but a bit of excitement for sure. But very little excitment compared to what came on Sunday.

We left early Sunday for Julian. Just a quick siteseeing trip to the old mining town in northern San Diego County. A pretty drive down highway 79, through Warner Springs, past Lake Henshaw. My daughter pointed out the many domes on top of Mount Palomar. Julian was fine. A tourist town. We had a nice lunch and bought our apple pie (apple pie is a local specialty). As they had the day before, the cumulus were forming by mid-day. We started back to Aguanga at about 1 pm. We had a little rain on the way back, particularly just after passing Sunshine Summit and Oak Grove. My daughter was quite excited about the rain (I was too). She said she wanted to be right in the middle of a big thunderstorm. Her mother told her to be careful what she asked for. Prophetic words indeed.

We ran into solid rain, desert thunderstorm style as we drove up California Highway 371 to Lake Riverside Estates (LRE). The truck (Did I mention the truck? Probably need to put the truck story in another post.) was bufetted by the wind and large drops hit us with loud smacks. We slowed way down. The rain started about 2 miles from the south gate to LRE. When we got to the gate, someone ahead of us had just swiped the card key but the gate was only partially opened and not moving. We got past. It was a bit tense at this point as the rain was coming down very hard and we still had two miles to go before we got to the house.

Some background information is important here. When we purchased the house, one item revealed in the disclosures was that several years ago a big storm had sent a stream of mud down the hill and into the house. The previous owners had done some extensive grading to prevent a recurrence. But we were worried.

We got back to the house. The major flow of water on the street was going away from the property, exactly as desired. There was a good flow down the hill, but at first glance it looked OK. We parked the truck and went in the house. Flash, bang, crash. Lightning closer than half a mile away. That cool ripping sound that comes when the flash is really close. Rain pounding down on the Sun porch and car port roofs. Water streaming out of the waterspouts. And a steady flow of water down the driveway, creating a growing mud-filled puddle in the car port.

I stomped around, trying to get it to drain until one too many flashes of lightning came close and I decided it wasn’t a good idea to get fried. My wife noticed that the water was not draining away from the Sun porch very well. The major drainage was working fine. The only problem was the drive, which was now filled with muddy water 6 inches deep.

The rain continued for at least 45 minutes. After one too many crashes of thunder, my daughter hid in the closet with her rats. Yes, I think she changed her mind about wanting to be in the middle of a storm!

After the rain stopped, I was able to find the drain and clear the pine needles away from it so it would drain. We were soon left with a lot of Anza mud, the wet version of the ever-present Anza dust. We got out the wheelbarrow and started shovelling. Progress was slow, but we were able to use the sand and mud to block the place where the water was sluicing down the drive. We cut a couple of channels that we hoped would divert much of the mud the next time. Several hours later, we (well my wife primarly as I went into Anza with a load of green stuff for the dump) finished the clean up. The drains had all worked. We now know what needs to be done to the driveway to permanently fix the problem.

And I hope we have seen the worst of the storms for a while.

Yesterday was yet another day of work in the yard in Aguanga. The effort to maintain 2.5 acres is beginning to sink in. The house in LA is virtually maintenance-free since it has all been recently landscaped and we can have a bi-weekly service come by for a very reasonable costs. Not so in Aguanga.

It started with the plumber’s arrival around 10am. When the LP gas company came by to set up our account, they found that the piping system would not hold pressure, so we were cut off. We have hired a plumber (covered by the home warranty we hope) to fix all the leaks. There are many leaks. The plumber estimates that at least half of the former owner’s gas bill was just leakage! Most of the leaks are new installations (since the last owners purchased) and show the signs of being done by amateur plumbers. There are zig-zagging short sections of pipe with many connections (75% of which leak). Our theory is that the installation was do-it-yourself as all the pipe lengths are off-the-shelf. A plumber would cut pipes to length and thread them. Not so the amateur.

After the plumber left, it was on to mowing the lawn. Last weekend we replaced the blade drive belt. The one the prior owner had on it (we bought the tractor-mower from him) was too short. Installed, it ran two of the three blades backwards. So, with it fixed, I was able to mow the lawn area. No problems here. It had been a couple of weeks, so it took two passes to get it done without bogging down the mower. Bagged the grass and I was done.

Next project: The jungle. On the hill in front of the house, an area of popple (or cottonwood) had been growing up like crazy and had become a jungle. Last weekend we fixed leaks in six of nine irrigation lines in the front. One was a broken pipe in the jungle. I bought a machete on Friday and attacked the jungle. An hour or so later, I had cleared a good portion of the jungle. I found another broken irrigation pipe. All that water was letting the plants grow out of control. There is still more clearing to do. If only I had the right motorized tool — a chainsaw perhaps?

I put a fresh tank of gas into the tractor mower, and thought I would clear some of the weeds out in the larger property. No problem until a wad of wire (that came from ?) went under the blades and wrapped around before I could shut them down. OK, run the tractor up on some boards, lie on the ground and slowly cut the wire away. 45 minutes later it was freed. A quick test run showed that it still cut on all three blades. I did have a scare when I heard a clattering noise. Fearing another wire tangle I looked back and saw a piece of re-bar sticking up out of the group. It is in a large piece of concrete near the gate. What other suprises are out there?

Finally, time for a shower and then off to Mass at Sacred Heart church in Anza. Oh, I forgot to mention checking the spa.

Whew. I was looking for a relaxing second home for observing. I’ll never get the observatory built until this backlog of maintenance gets knocked down. But I did get to observe. More on that in another post.

We came out to Aguanga last night, leaving LA around 8:10. We stopped at Home Depot for a few items and made it to the house at about 10:40. The clouds had come down so we arrived in a dense fog that lasted most of the night. Within an hour or so things were cooled off in the house for a nice quiet evening.

Today was a day of work, as a new house often is. I took a trip to the local waste transfer station to drop of a bunch of used boxes, then set about cleaning the floor of the workshop. It was (and still is, for that matter) very dirty. It had flooded during a severe storm and there was a layer of dried mud on the floor.

We wet down the floor, scrubbed it, then vacumed up the water. It made a huge difference. The process literally created mud which was then slurped up into the shop vac. We cleaned 2/3 of the space — exactly what we had planned. I then took a mop and plain water and cleaned a section we had already cleaned. I got up a bunch of mud and dirt. I can’t imagine what I would have gotten up if I had used a cleaner.

At any rate, it looks a lot better. It will be very nice once it has been thoroughly cleaned and painted.

We are here in Aguanga and have internet connectivity!

It has been over a month since I last posted. And it sure has been a month.

In late June I travelled to Europe for work. Arrived in Paris on Sunday and did the 5-hour tour hitting the Tuilleries, The Louvre (saw the Mona Lisa), Isle St. Louis, Notre Dame, the Left Bank, dinner at Foucquet’s on the Champs-Elysées, a quick view of the Eiffel Tower before heading back to the hotel. Whew. It was good to do some sightseeing because the rest of the week was work. Monday night to Brussels (yes, if it’s Tuesday, it must be Belgium), Tuesday night to Munich, Wednesday night to London, Saturday home.

After two days back at work, we left on vacation to Alaska, taking a wonderful tour and cruise through Cruise West. Our good friend Ken Neibaur arranged the tour — he works for Cardoza Bungey travel. It was a great trip, absolutely way above our expectations. I’ll try and post some details on it later. We took the Glacier Bay Highlights tour with a stay over at the Kantishna Road House. If you go to Denali, I definitely recommend staying at the far end of the park in Kantishna. For cruises, the Cruise West small ships (ours was 70 passengers) is an outstanding way to really see Alaska up close.

We also got to spend a day with my brother-in-law Walt. That was very nice.

Back at work now and finally sneaking in the time to make a post.

Oh, and we closed the purchase of a second home in Aguanga. More on that later too. So we have been busy.

For a blog (and a site, for that matter) that is supposed to be dedicated to astronomy, there has been precious little astronomy for the last several months.

Back in January, I removed the NP-101 and put the C-11 back on the mount intending to take some longer focal length images. Several factors interfered.

• Changing Equipment. The effort to re-balance the mount and set-up the whole thing to work with the C-11 instead of the NP-101. Note that the NP-101 set-up was done when I was on an extended vacation between jobs.
• Weather. Our rain came late and in small batches. Not good for investing the time required for a new set-up and getting good images.
• Work. New job, new responsibilities, less time for astronomy. And that winning lottery ticket is still very elusive .
• Property Quest. We have been looking at property to be a site for a darker sky site (not really dark as the location has to work as a local “camp” as well as an observatory site) and that has taken significant time.

Enough whining. I have posted some nice shots of Saturn. I have some Jupiter data in the pipeline. The bottom line is that all of these things are about having fun, right?

We have been looking at second homes in the Anza Valley area east of Temecula. The goal is to have a place to get away to and one that has dark skies.

Our search narrowed to a community called Lake Riverside Estates. It a gated community (but all dirt streets) with a small lake, a dirt airstrip, and a community pool. While not the darkest location, this clearly meets the multi-use requirement for such an investment.

Not quite Camp, but perhaps a passable Southern California version of Camp.

I spent this past week in Orlando at Sapphire, SAP’s annual convention. This year it was combined with the annual ASUG meeting, the America’s SAP User’s Group meeting. But that’s not the subject of this post.

I flew UAL on the return flight. UAL is the only airline that makes air traffic control (ATC) available to passengers. It is found onj channel 9. When I was travelling a lot for business, I was a big UAL flyer. 1K for three years running (ok, big, but not great since many people fly more than I did and for more years running). I really enjoyed the ATC banter.

On this flight, about an hour before arrival, the captain invited us to listen in for a discussion about the flight. He spoke for 30 minutes on a whole variety of topics. It was really a hoot. He spoke about:

• Which controller is in talking to the plane as you go from gate to take off
• The statistics of the 757 — the most efficient plane in the sky
• What causes turbulence
• What kind of turbulence is dangerous and why
• The approach and how the pilots interact with ATC
• The seniority system at UAL

It was really great to hear him talk about his job. At one point, he said “I don’t have any idea if anyone at all is listening to this, so if you are listening and you want me to continue, please turn your call button on and then off.” Many people around the plane (including myself) pinged him with the call buttons. He was very appreciative of the support.

It was very nice to have a senior person with the airline speak so highly and professionally about both his company and the overall air traffic system.

One of my pet peeves with recorded classical music is that you have to turn the volume way up to hear the soft parts (a nice oboe solo) but then be ready to crank it down when the whole orchestra chimes in. In the concert hall, the soft comes out very clearly and the loudest loud doesn’t hurt the ears.

I suppose it is a combination of a very quiet environment and the fact that the orchestra never gets that loud. Amplified music can get very loud. I wonder if the actual dynamic range is compressed somehow in the hall. I doubt it. I bet it is a phenomenon of the quiet of the hall allowing you to hear the quiet and the loud never being as loud as top volume on the iPod.

Near our house there is a large development called Playa Vista. It has fought its way through numerous lawsuits, oppositions, Dreamworks pulling out, etc. Part of the deal for building on the site was that the developer would restore and maintain wetlands in the area. This post is about the restored area west of Lincoln Boulevard and south of Jefferson Boulevard.

Before the restoration, this area was flat and grassy, not interesting. I watched as they built smoothed channels and berms. It looked very manufactured. Trees and shrubs were planted, water was let in. It began to look better.

A couple of weeks ago, there was an event at these new, manufactured, wetlands. Many groups, from the DWP to the Ballona Creek Renaissance were there. It was great fun and what made it great was the wildlife we could see in the wetlands. Yes, the manufactured wetlands.

Last weekend, we went for a walk in the wetlands area. At the start, my wife didn’t want the binoculars, and my daughter thought it would be boring (although she knew better than to complain). It turned out to be a great experience. We saw red winged blackbirds, American coots, a killdeer, and best of all, a family of mallards.

The mallard family was a mother and seven ducklings. We watched as the swam along the shore feeding. Mother mallard decided she wanted to look at an area beyond a small man-made berm. She jumped over, but it was a challenge for the ducklings. We watched as she went back and encouraged them to jump over the berm. And then she went back. Watching these little ducklings, not too much larger than an egg and very fluffing, was tremendous fun. It made the whole visit.

And all just about a mile from our house.